Netflix Renames DVD Service

VN:F [1.9.22_1171]
Rating: 0.0/5 (0 votes cast)

The ubiquitous red envelopes will endure, but they will carry a new name.Netflix is rebranding its 12-year-old movies-by-mail service as Qwikster and adding video games to its catalog, Reed Hastings, the company’s CEO, announced Sunday night. The Web-streaming portion will continue to be called Netflix, he wrote on the company’s blog.After the separation, people who subscribe to both services will have to log into two separate websites, Netflix.com and Qwikster.com, to manage their movie queues and account information, Hastings wrote. Customer reviews and ratings from Netflix will be ported to Qwikster for the launch, but after that, people will have to rate and search for movies on each site separately, he wrote.Qwikster’s site currently presents a landing page that says it is “launching soon.” Hastings did not offer a timeline for Qwikster’s debut. Andy Rendich, the operations chief and 12-year veteran of the company, will run the new mail-order arm.In addition to DVDs and Blu-ray discs, the new service will offer console games for Microsoft’s Xbox 360, Nintendo’s Wii and Sony’s PlayStation 3 for an extra monthly fee. The change will put pressure on GameFly, a competing service dedicated to subscription game mailings. CNN